Strangled by Spider Plant

One of our potted Japanese maples has not been doing so well lately, but the spider plant in the pot was doing marvelously, sending out flowers and little shoots.  I had heard that spider plants only flower and make shoots when they run out of room in their pot, so I wondered if it was out-competing the tree roots.

What I dug up surprised me!

Monster roots.

I had no idea that the roots were so crazily thick and bulbous.  It was definitely choking out the tree roots, and has been transplanted to a new pot of its own.

Here's hoping our maple springs back.